Method of producing a non-woven pile product

ABSTRACT

Frozen stacks, at least mainly consisting of sheet material and which may include leather, plastic, textile fabric, foil and the like in scrap or other irregular sheet form, are sliced to form slabs, at least one face of which is bonded to backing material to form individual tiles for application to walls, floors, ceilings or the like, or to form panel elements of carpets, rugs, mats or similar articles.

I United States Paten [1 1 [111 3,767,495

Miller 1 Oct. 23, 1973 [54] METHOD OF PRODUCING A NON- WOVEN 3,359,147 12/1967 Miller 156/80 X L PRODUCT 1,012,389 12/1911 Marche.. 156/80 X 3,085,922 4/1963 Koller 156/264 X Inventor:

Paul E. Miller, Norristown, Pa.

Thermo Weave, Inc., Norristown,

Filed: July 14, 1971 Appl. No.: 162,645

Related U.S. Application Data Continuation of Ser. No. 776,622, Nov. 18, 1968, abandoned.

Assignee:

[52] U.S. Cl 156/72, 156/80, 156/250,

156/498 [51] Int. Cl B29b 3/00 [58] Field of Search 156/80, 264, 265,

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,788,835 4/1957 Brookes et a1. 156/72 Primary Examiner-George F. Lesmes Assistant Examiner-Henry F. Epstein AttorneyWoodcock, Washburn, Kurtz & Maciewicz 3 Claims, 6 Drawing Figures METHOD OF PRODUCING A NON-WOVEN PILE PRODUCT This application is a continuation of parent application Ser. No. 776,622 filed Nov. 18, 1968, now abandoned.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention, in some of its aspects, is an extension or modification of my prior US. Pat. No. 3,359,147 and, inter alia, provides for utilization of leather and other materials available as sheet scrap from various manufacturing processes and so having irregularities in size, color, shape, cutout-pattern or other scrap characteristic.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The pile materials used are in sheet form and may be of plastic, leather, textile fabric and the like. The sheets of pile material are arranged in layers to form a stack in which adjacent layers are either in contact or spaced. In either case, the sheets before stacking, or as stacked, are moistened and'the stack is frozen. The frozen stack is sliced at a desired angle to form slabs with pile strips extending lengthwise between the side edges of the slab.

The facial design of each of the slabs corresponds with the characteristics of the sheets at the region where the slab cut is made. Having in mind that the stacked sheets may be either different or similar in shape, color, cut-out and other individual characteristics, the facial design may be unpredictable or predictable. For example, the facial designs of the slabs are random if the sheets are randomly placed in the stack or randomly differ in one or more of their characteristics. On the other hand, a predetermined facial design can be obtained by forming the stack with controlled spacing of the sheets having predetermined characteristics and controlling the relative longitudinal and lateral' positioning of color, cut-out, shape and other material characteristics of individual sheets of the stack.

One or both faces of the slab may be bonded to a backing layer depending upon the desired ultimate use of the article or product. For example, a rug, mat or carpet element requires bonding of only one face of the slab. The unbonded face may be additionally cut crosswise so to form from each of the lengthwise pile strips a multiplicity of upstanding pile elements extending to or toward the coated face of the slab. Both faces of the slab may be bonded to make a heat-insulating tile or cushion, or to make a double-faced pile product which can be split to form two tiles with similar pile-face design. V

For a more complete understanding of the invention, reference may be had to the accompanying drawing and to the later detailed description.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 schematically illustrates successive stages of a method of making non-woven pile articles from sheet material;

FIG. 2, in perspective and in section, shows 'a nonwoven pile panel or tile which can be made by steps shown in FIG. 1 and whose exposed face present a ribbed appearance;

FIG. 3, in perspective, shows a parquet arrangement of panels of the rib type shown in FIG. 2;

FIG. 4, in perspective and in section, shows another non-woven pile panel or tile which can be made by steps shown in FIG. 1 and whose exposed face simulates cut fabric tile;

FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view, on enlarged scale, of the tile shown in FIG. 4; and

FIG. 6 is a perspective view of a heat-insulating or cushion tile which can be made by steps shown in FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION Referring to FIG. 1, a multiplicity of sheets are laid one upon another on a support 12A such as provided by a work table or conveyor to form a stack C. At least a substantial number of the sheets or layers of the stack may be scrap pieces of natural or synthetic leather from which have been punched out various components of shoes, handbags and the like, or they may be scrap pieces of plastic sheet or foil from other manufacturing processes. These scrap sheets may be, and usually are of irregular size and shape; and particularly when of natural leather, the locations of their cut-out areas are different in different sheets. Such irregularities and differences, for reasons which later appear, provide a random face pattern for non-woven pile tiles or panels embodying the present invention. Some of the sheets may be, and preferably are, of the same preselected width and may be cut as by knife 10 from any one or more of the webs Al-An stored in roll form on a creel of supply rolls. The webs maybe of different color and/or of different material such as plastic, textile fabric, foil and the like.

During formation of the stack, the individual sheets are moistened as by water supplied from one or more nozzles 9. Preferably, the sides of the stack C are squared as by .the side plates 11 which may be in position during assembly of the sheets or may be positioned after assembly of the loosely piled sheets. In any event, the completed stack C of sheets is compressed, as by spaced calender rolls 13, and then passed into a freezing zone or chamber 14 where the compressed stack is converted into a frozen block of immobilized sheets. The freezing chamber may be of type shown in my aforesaid patent. To accelerate the freezing process,

'the compression rolls 13 may be chilled as by flow of ice water or other coolant through them.

After the stack has been frozen, it is sliced, as by the knife or other cutting means 15, to form a series of frozen slabs D in which the pile strips E extend lengthwise, as ribbon strips between ends of the slab. The slab face pattern as defined by these strips varies from slab to slab because of the irregularities and discontinuities in the cross-section of the stack as advanced beyond the cutting means for slicing. Changing the angle of slicing will also vary the appearance of the slab face from an open-blind effect for a perpendicular cut to a more or less closed-blind effect for different angles of the cut.

The frozen slabs D in turn or as a group are passed through the defreezing/drying zone or chamber 17' or may be applied with different orientation as in FIG. 3 to obtain a parquet effect.

Reverting to FIG. 1, the edge bonding of the ribbon strips E to form such paneled tile T, or array of tiles T, may be effected by application ofa heated web or sheet consisting of or coated with thermoplastic material. An electric heater may be used, as shown, to soften the web just prior to its application to a face of a defrozen slab D. Alternatively, the bonding may be effected by passing the defrozen slab D under an extruder head from which issues a web of molten plastic. It will be understood that during transport from zone 17 and during coating of the defrozen slab, its sides and ends are engaged by confining plates or structure not shown.

To form a tile having the facial appearance of tile T2, FIG. 4, tile T is moved beyond the coating zone to pass between closely spaced knife blades 19 which cut the individual pile strips or ribbons crosswise into a multiplicity of upstanding pile elements.

As shown in FIG. 5, an individual ribbon strip E (FIG. 2) has been in effect converted to a comb whose back edge is bonded into backing layer F and whose teeth H freely extend from the backing layer as pile elements resembling the cut pile of woven fabric. In the particular comb of FIG. 5, the variations in height of pile elements H are due to cut-outs in the corresponding scrap sheet of the particular original stack C from which the slab was cut.

To produce a heat-insulating or cushion tile T3 (FIG. 6), both faces of the defrozen slab D (FIG. 1) are respectively bonded to or into the backing layers F, Fl. As shown, the opposite edges of each of the ribbon strips E are respectively attached to or embedded in the backing layers F, F1, so leaving a multiplicity of elongated confined spaces each respectively extending from one side edge of the tile to the other. The tiles T,T3 also are yielding, or soft, since the ribbon strips E are free to flex between their bonded edges when pressure is applied to either face of the tile. It is also to be noted that a tile T3 may be split intermediate the coated faces to form two tiles T having a ribbed appearance, as shown in FIG. 2, and each ofwhich may be slitted crosswise intermediate its coated faces to form a tile T2 having the cut-pile appearance shown in FIG. 4.

From the foregoing, it will be appreciated that the method above described provides not only for a preselection of the general facial appearance of the ultimate non-woven pile fabric, i.e., ribbed or cut pile, but also provides unpredictable design patterns for individual tiles which moreover differ for the different tiles. Such uniqueness of the facial pattern of individual tiles arises because of the irregularities and discontinuities of the sheet scrap material incorporated in an original stack C. Also such individual tiles of different general appearance and uniquely different in appearance may be used jointly to form in any desired arrangement larger areas whose variety of appearance is limited only by the designer's imagination.

With the arrangement shown in FIG. 1, individual sheets in scrap or other irregular form may be interposed between selected webs as they pass from the supply creel Al-An to the calender rolls 13,13. In such case, the knife 10 is inoperative or omitted so that in effect a continuous stack is formed and frozen as the sheet layers are intermittently advanced to the slabcutting station exemplified by knife 15. In other respects, this continuous method is the same as the batch method above described.

With both methods above described, random facial designs of the slabs cut from the stack are obtained when individual sheets of the same or different characteristics are randomly positioned in the stack and are also obtained when scrap sheets, though similarly positioned in the stack, are used because such sheets usually differ in one or more of the individual sheet characteristics, such as shape, size, color, cut-out location and the like.

With both methods however, it is possible to use pile material in sheet form to obtain a predetermined facial design for the slabs cut from the stack. This requires use of sheets whose individual characteristics are predetermined and requires control of the stacking of such sheets for predetermined location of such characteristics in successive cross-sections of the stack as exposed when slabs are cut from the stack.

Also with both methods, the spacing between the stacked sheets may be controlled as by edge-rolls or guides to leave inter-sheet voids which receive a slurry or mixture such as of liquid and lint, pulp and the like. In this case, the rolls 13,13 do not compress the stack so that in the stack as frozen the sheets of pile material are held separated by the intervening frozen slurry. When slabs are cut, as by knife 15 or equivalent, from the frozen stack, the controlled spacing between the pile strips E is maintained. In this case, as may also be true of the methods previously described, the slab is not completely thawed in zone 17. For example, the lateral ends of the slab may be left frozen for the time-being so that the spacing between the pile strips is maintained as the slab emerges from zone 17 for bonding of one or both ofits faces. The face-bonding is to the edges of the ribbon pile strips E and to the lint or other spacing material adjacent those edges. The unbonded spacing material may later be removed by vacuuming when the final product has one exposed pile face. As another example ofincomplete thawing of the slab in zone 17, the heat sources may be designed or controlled so that the thawing, depthwise of the slab, extends only partially from one face. As the slab emerges from the thawing zone 17, the bonding is progressively applied to the thawed face, so permanently to hold the corresponding edges of the ribbon pile strips and the adjacent spacing material between them. Again the unbonded lint, or other spacing material, may be removed by vacuuming.

In both cases, the lint or equivalent spacing material introduced in the slurry may be of desired color or colors so that the lint retained after vacuuming of the final product provides a color background in the spaces between the pile strips and so becomes part ofa facial design.

Water-soluble adhesives, including resins, may be used for bonding to the still frozen slab, so eliminating the need for the defreezing step and simplifying the equipment required to practice the various methods above described. The term lint spacing material as used in the appended claims, is intended to include pulp, lint or other equivalent spacing material.

What is claimed is:

1. A method of producing a non-woven pile product which comprises,

concurrently feeding a plurality of spacing webs of flexible sheet material in superposed relation to form spaced layers at a station,

the slab with a backing layer. 2. A method as in claim 1 including the additional step of removing from between the pile strips of the slab, at least a portion of the lint spacing material of the in troduced slurry. 3. A method as in claim 1 wherein the ribbon-like pile strips are cut crosswise into a multiplicity of teeth to form pile elements upstanding from said backing layer. 

1. A method of producing a non-woven pile product which comprises, concurrently feeding a plurality of spacing webs of flexible sheet material in superposed relation to form spaced layers at a station, introducing a freezable slurry including a lint spacing material between said spaced layers at said station to form a stack, freezing said stack to form a frozen stack of immobilized layers of sheet material, cutting said frozen stack transversely of said layers to form frozen slabs each having a number of ribbon like pile strips arranged on edge and extending lengthwise between two opposite edges of the slab, and effecting bonding engagement of at least one face of the slab with a backing layer.
 2. A method as in claim 1 including the additional step of removing from between the pile strips of the slab, at least a portion of the lint spacing material of the introduced slurry.
 3. A method as in claim 1 wherein the ribbon-like pile strips are cut crosswise into a multiplicity of teeth to form pile elements upstanding from said backing layer. 